


Smoke

by ghost_like



Series: 31 Days of Halloween 2k18 [14]
Category: Dreamcatcher (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Witch Hunt, Witch Trials, Witchcraft, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-14
Updated: 2018-10-14
Packaged: 2019-08-02 06:52:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16300175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghost_like/pseuds/ghost_like
Summary: There was nothing like a public execution to get the people to want to participate in the town’s activities. Children being baptized were a snoozer, administrative announcements a bore - but people being killed in brutal ways for the enjoyment of the masses? What fun.





	Smoke

**Author's Note:**

> i said it once and i'll say it again: dreamcatcher = witchcraft
> 
> today's prompt is "fire"
> 
> enjoy!♡

There was nothing like a public execution to get the people to want to participate in the town’s activities. Children being baptized were a snoozer, administrative announcements a bore - but people being killed in brutal ways for the enjoyment of the masses? What fun.

Bora tried to keep the distaste off her face, keeping her expression as neutral as possible while on the inside she was hating the entire spectacle.

The girl they had tied to the stake was terrified, bawling her eyes out. She looked so _young_ , perhaps barely fifteen or sixteen. That was not a place for a girl so young, and yet—

“Please, please, sir! I am innocent, please, I swear—!” the girl screamed at the executioner, a tall, burly man with a mean face and no hair. “Please, sir, I promise you I am no witch, I am not a witch!”

The man paid her no mind, continuing to prepare the bales of hay around her. Each one that was set out brought out a new scream from the girl, a woman who looked to be her mother wailing right at the head of the crowd that was gathered there.

It made her sick to her stomach.

When the executioner produced a torch and set it aflame, the girl’s screams became so loud and high pitched it was hard to even hear her anymore.

“Mercy, please! _Please sir show mercy please don’t—!”_

Without batting an eye to the girl’s pleas, the man touched the hay with the flame of his torch, going around the pyre to make sure the fire would spread. Bora covered her mouth with her hand when the smell of smoke and burnt straw wafted towards her; it was shaking.

Only to make that entire ordeal worse, the crowd - mob, really - began hollering cheers and throwing food and rocks at her, yelling all sorts of obscenities and how she would forever burn in Hell, how their village would be better off without her, how they didn’t need a filthy witch to bring plague and discord to their God-fearing settlement.

Bora was angry, so angry; guilty or not - most likely not - that girl was little more than a child! If she was sentenced to death, they should have at least offered her the courtesy to make it a death with dignity, not that circus or whatever that execution was meant to be.

The girl’s screams became louder, more anguished, more pained, the wailing of her mother was that of a banshee in mourning, the smell of burnt hay was replaced by the overpowering stench of charred flesh, of burnt hair. Bora’s eyes were stinging with the smoke that got into them, but she forced herself to watch, forced herself to ingrain that scene to her mind.

It was perhaps divine intervention, but the girl went silent very fast - the pain, perhaps, caused her to pass out. It was better like that, Bora thought. It was better to pass on to the afterlife in silence, as opposed to screaming with pain and terror.

Bora stayed on for a little while longer, watching as the girl’s body became coal and ashes, smoke into the sky, before she turned around and walked away.

She allowed herself a secret smile; as long as they kept burning the wrong people, she would be safe from the pyre.

**Author's Note:**

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